CHAPTER XII
Mr. Burrows was gravely disturbed. Sufficient had been his responsibility ever since a dying sister bequeathed to him the guardianship of her child. At first he had not taken the matter very seriously. The girl was at school, doubtless being well cared for, but presently, although every dollar he could raise was needed for costly mining machinery, he had to pay her tuition fees. Then the Lady Superintendent wrote, hinting deftly that her pupil had reached an age when the chaperon might have a more desirable influence than a teacher. He never read between the lines, he was too little a man of the world to realise that a paying pupil would not be unacceptable to any lady superintendent so long as the young person was docile. The young person in question was anything but docile, as Mr. Burrows found to his grief when Miss Violet came to rule himself and his mine with a rod of iron. Certainly she cost less at a time of straitened means than his late Chinese cook; but then, she was such a nuisance. He loved her not at all, his affections being wholly devoted to certain patented steel fans in a cylinder. Unlike the steel fans, she set his will at naught, ignored his rules, his regulations, his beautifully machine-made precepts, distracted him with interruptions, pulled his ear, demanded new frocks which were quite beyond his means, and finally, to crown her misdemeanours, fell in love. His cylinder never fell in love, or, if it conceived so indelicate a line of action, would certainly refrain from two several and concurrent flirtations.
Miss Violet seemed bound by no rules, subject to no conceivable laws, therefore, like that nonsensical abstraction, Religion, she was beyond the pale of reasonable study. Not being acquainted with the factors of the love problem, or dealing in the abstruse mathematics of whims, Mr. Burrows blandly ignored the whole subject for six weeks; consequently, when circumstances compelled him to bring to bear the forces of his intellect, he was just six weeks too late. So far as he could see, which was not quite to the end of his nose, he then found the facts somewhat as follows.
Miss Violet was in love, but whether with young Ramsay, or with that big policeman, or with both at once, was a matter of no moment. Inasmuch as Mr. Burrows had reached the age of fifty without loving anybody better than himself, Miss Violet's behaviour was at once ridiculous and unnatural. She was only nineteen, a child fresh from school, her vocation in life to cook his meals, make his bed, keep her tongue from chatter and her fingers from his ears. (The fact that his ears were large and seductively ugly could not palliate the young woman's mania for stroking them.) In short, Miss Violet had no right to love, and, as to marrying, her duty was to himself. Almost with tears in his eyes he pictured the loneliness to which she would selfishly consign him if she married. She should not marry—it would not be good for her.
Then there was the big policeman, who never failed to spend his Sundays hard by at the Tough Nut Claim. Mr. Burrows, priding himself on his powers of observation, found something furtive, something underhand and dishonourable in the way that policeman avoided his own hospitality. He had written to the Officer Commanding at Wild Horse Creek, protesting on behalf of the "mining population" against weekly visits of a disreputable character to the Throne Mining Camp. This took effect upon the Colonel, who counted any disparagement of his men as a personal affront to himself, and, pending the chastisement of the writer, saw that La Mancha never asked in vain for Sunday's leave.
And, last element of the love problem, Mr. Ramsay, who should have been making an exhaustive study of mine and mill for his father's firm, spent the time sulking about the hills. A workhouse pauper who has dropped a penny down a grating could not have looked more forlorn.
So two months went by. Miss Violet very demure, like a kitten after its first mouse; the Blackguard spending every Saturday and Sunday night in the saddle to snatch brief hours for courtship; the Tenderfoot perched in desolate places brooding on suicide.
Then of a sudden Mr. Ramsay became demurely expectant, and Miss Violet unnaturally gay. Some new absurdity was in the wind, so Mr. Burrows, with the gingerly air of one broaching a gift of untasted wine, had a few words with his niece.
"Come here, Violet."
"Yes, Uncle."
"What does all this mean?"
"Nothing, Uncle."
"That policeman did not come to the Tough Nut Claim on Sunday."
"Didn't he, Uncle?"
"Why didn't he come?"
"I'm sure I don't know. He doesn't belong to me. Do you want him very much, Uncle?"
"Want him? Of course, I don't want him. What should I want him for? Now, answer me this—what are your intentions with regard to Mr. Ramsay?"
"I was just thinking about that." She perched on the table beside him. "The saucepan's too small, you see. Would you like him poached?"
Since there was but little change to be got out of Miss Violet, Mr. Burrows went off fuming and fussing in search of his guest, who was discovered in a state of innocent bliss, fishing with rod and line from the edge of the great precipice.
"What are you doing?"
"Hush, you'll disturb the swallows. One of them pecked my worm."
"Haw—ah—indeed." Mr. Burrows sat down on the next rock, grunting. "Mister Ramsay, I know that these matters are delicate, and require to be dealt with by a man of tact."
"Indeed they do—they won't even look at a fly."
"I am not alluding to birds, Mr. Ramsay. May I ask what your intentions are with regard to my niece?"
"Eh?" Mr. Ramsay glanced at the other sideways. "I say, would you mind very much if I were to—to pay my addresses to Miss Violet?"
"Certainly not, my dear Mr. Ramsay. The human affection always meets with my warmest approbation—the—in fact, my very warmest approbation. Let me shake you by the hand."
"I wouldn't, if I were you—fact is—worms, you know. I hope you're not sitting on any of them?"
Mr. Burrows' approbation of the human affections was suddenly mitigated; he jumped up with a sudden but strictly philosophical remark—but seeing that this matter of the worms was a false alarm, he breathed more freely, and, grunting again, sat down.
"No, that's all right!" the Tenderfoot felt very much relieved. "You haven't spoilt one of them. I ought to tell you, though,—you were so busy I didn't like to mention it before,—that we're engaged."
"Since when, my dear young friend?"
"Oh, months ago—it must be supper time. Why don't they bite? I love her desperately."
"Your sentiments do you justice. The alliance between our families will do much, my young friend, to strengthen the material bonds which are about to so closely unite my interests to those of your respected father. The brilliant future in store for the Burrows-Ramsay Mining & Milling Syndicate Limited"—
"By George," cried the Tenderfoot joyfully, while the rod jerked in his hand, "I've got a bite!"